Emergency response organizations increasingly depend on wireless communication technology to provide communication during emergencies. Disadvantageously, however, emergencies often result in damage to, or sometimes even destruction of, existing network infrastructure, thereby preventing communications between emergency personnel. In other words, the existing communications infrastructure lacks survivability. Furthermore, even if portions of the existing communications infrastructure do survive the emergency, the existing communications infrastructure may not be able to handle the increased traffic load typical during emergencies. Specifically, remaining portions of the existing communication infrastructure may be overloaded as emergency personnel, and the general public, attempt various types of communications. Such deficiencies became clear during the events of Sep. 11, 2001, and again during the events of Hurricane Katrina.
Currently, base stations are deployed to the field in fixed infrastructure networks in which deployment time, and the time that is required to activate the base stations to provide service, is less critical than during emergency response situations. Disadvantageously, base station activation time (during which the base station cannot provide any service) is typically around ten to fifteen minutes, and possibly even longer. This base station activation time is unacceptably large during emergencies situations, where every minute is important. An alternative solution used during emergency situations is to keep the base stations activated and continuously transmitting, however, this requires a constant source of power, even when the base stations are not in use, and is, in general, wasteful of energy.